I've had the pleasure of owning a recently-serviced Omega Constellation Double Eagle for a few days now, and felt it was time to share some photos and impressions of this great watch.

The fact that Omega makes/has made thermo-compensated high accuracy quartz watches was news to me up until about a week ago. This watch uses the ETA 252.511, re-branded as Omega Caliber 1680. Not only does this movement feature +/- 10 second per year accuracy, it also packs in a date-only perpetual calendar, independently-settable hour hand and a 4-year battery with EOL indicator. On top of all that, this watch is quite inexpensive by modern Omega standards, with prices in the ballpark of ~$2.5K AUD for most mint condition pre-owned models on the grey market.

In the metal this watch is very textually and visually diverse. The case and bracelet are made of a horizontally-brushed steel, which looks and feels quite retro in comparison to most modern vertical satin-brushed bracelets. The engraved bezel is brushed in a circular pattern, with contrasting highly polished "claws" at 3 O'Clock and 9 O'Clock. The claws are rounded, with no hard edges or beveling, resembling the likes of ocean-smoothed pebbles.

Getting a perfect fit with this bracelet is not easy, particularly if (like me) you have a smaller wrist. It took me 4 visits to 2 different jewelers to get it just right. There are two short links to either side of the Omega-logo clasp that are not removable, as the butterfly clasp attaches to the back of these links and the extra short links that are included lack this attachment feature.

Using a spare half-link immediately after one of the two fixed half-links breaks the visual aesthetic of the clasp, unbalancing it by showing two highly-polished lines on one side and only one on the other. In the end getting a good fit involved using one of the half-links further along the bracelet between two full-size links to ensure the visual aesthetic around the clasp was maintained. This also aided in making the quite rigid bracelet more flexible right where it needs to contour the most.

Nonetheless, a good fit was in the end achieved, which has made this watch easily the most comfortable in my current collection. The butterfly clasp is wonderfully smooth and contoured, and the watch is light-weight enough that I can forget I'm even wearing it.

The Double Eagle has quite a low profile, encouraging its use as a dressy watch, but the roman numeral engraved bezel and somewhat Gerald Genta-like case shape lends it some personally and versatility. You could quite easily use this as a "one watch", as it will go equally well with a tshirt and jeans as it does with a suit and tie.

Despite the Omega website listing the dial as "black", it is in fact a kind of slate-grey when viewed in decent lighting. The indices are multi-faceted and highly polished, which when combined with the sword-like polished hands reminds me strongly of a Grand Seiko. The date aperture is also framed with highly polished metal, and even the little star beneath the "perpetual calendar" dial text is very 3-dimensional and catches the light in an entrancing way.

The sapphire crystal face is slightly domed, but it is fitted almost exactly to the surrounding metal bezel, with no overlap or defining edge other than a very thin hairline around the face too narrow to fit a fingernail into. In terms of the tactile feel of the watch this is very different to the likes of the Tudor Black Bay, where the crystal is both more aggressively domed and has a clear divide between face and bezel.

The hour and minute hands each have a thin strip of lume, and luminescent dots are used along the minute track, with double-dots at 12, 3, 6 and 9 to orient the dial in the dark. If you've recently transitioned from a bright area to a dark one the lume is quite visible, but it fades overnight and completely disappears around 1am in my experience. The little dots of glowing lume pay a kind of homage to the name "Constellation" in my mind, looking a little like stars glittering in a night sky.

Although this watch supposedly has a 38mm face, Omega has measured this as including the rather wide engraved bezel. Consequentially the actual watch dial is quite small and delicate by today's standards.

All in all I am very happy with the Double Eagle. It's a dress watch with personality, and an unexpectedly cutting-edge movement under the hood. It won't be replacing my Tudor North Flag as my daily wearer, nor will it replace my Black Bay as a weekend/leisure watch, but it is versatile enough that it could stand in for either in a pinch.

As I tend not to wear dress watches all that often, the idea of a HAQ Perpetual Calendar is also very appealing. No matter how infrequently I need it, it will always be ready to go and always be accurate.